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from the adding-injury-and-insult-to-insult-and-injury dept.
The anonymous woman was raped in Houston in 2013, according to court documents, and was cooperating with prosecutors when she suffered a breakdown while testifying in December 2015.
She has bipolar disorder and was admitted to a local hospital for mental health treatment when the judge ordered a recess for the holiday break until January 2016.
According to the documents, authorities were scheduled to be on vacation and "did not want the responsibility of having to monitor Jane Doe's well being or provide victim services to her during the holiday recess."
The complaint alleges that the district attorney's office obtained an order from the Harris County sheriff to take the woman into custody so she would not flee before completing her testimony.
The employee booking her into Harris County Jail identified her as a "defendant in a sexual assault case, rather than the victim." That impacted her treatment from jail staff, as the complaint reads:
The Harris County Jail psychiatric staff tormented Jane Doe and caused her extreme emotional distress and mental anguish by further defaming her, falsely insisting to her that she was being charged with sexual assault, and refusing to acknowledge her status as an innocent rape victim."
Doe also suffered beatings from other inmates and from a guard, who then requested assault charges to be filed against her "in an attempt to cover up the brutal abuse," according to the complaint.
[...] The complaint notes that her "rapist was also an inmate in the same facility" and treated more humanely. "Her rapist was not denied medical care, psychologically tortured, brutalized by other inmates, or beaten by jail guards," it reads.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 25 2016, @03:43PM
I threatened to disbar poor Mr. Cane
Yeah, I'm sure he was very afraid of your imaginary magical power to disbar ...
(Score: 5, Insightful) by TrumpetPower! on Monday July 25 2016, @04:05PM
MDC is one of our own -- a reasonably talented coder who's something of a social misfit. He also struggles with some non-trivial mental health problems.
In a civilized society, his ills would be like any other disability: a major pain in the ass, to be sure, but not an insurmountable barrier to living a fruitful life as a full and productive member of society. Yeah, he needs a bit more help than average, but that investment would still pay off quite well. And don't kid yourself -- we all need help from society: did you lay the pipes from your toilet to the wastewater treatment facility, and did you build that facility yourself? The reason you're not living next to a cesspool is because of the investment society made in you so you wouldn't have to.
MDC's frist ps0t might at first seem offtopic...but the experience he describes is a symptom of the exact same disease poor Ms. Doe fell victim to: the truly shamelessly horrifically way we treat those who fall into the black hole of our criminal injustice system.
These people need our help to get back on their feet every much as we ourselves need help to stay on our feet. That we should fail them at their darkest hours is inexcusable and incomprehensible.
And, yes. That includes the worst of the worst -- the Bundys and the Dahlmers and the Mansons. We obviously need to protect ourselves against them...but to go from protecting society from threats to becoming an active threat is as perverted a twist of logic as it gets. If some serial killer kidnapped his victims for years and then put together something that looked like a surgical theatre, dressed up as a doctor, and killed his victims in a fake medical procedure, that'd make him one of the most notorious such in all history -- yet we band together to do exactly that, in the most calculating cold blood, and pat ourselves on the back for a job well done and justice served.
And all the way back in the other direction...a woman who was raped was suspected of being a rapist, so somebody felt justified in kidnapping her and making her life a living hell...for what good purpose, exactly? Even if she were herself a rapist, how on Earth would the world be a better place for what was done to her?
You know how we look back at the Inquisition in horror and collective shame? How the sanitariums of a century ago are incomprehensible to the modern mind?
In another century or three, our descendants will view today's criminal "justice" system exactly the same way. They'll wonder how their ancestors could possibly have been so cruel and stupid.
They'll rightly conclude that these are dark ages and a blight upon human history.
Cheers,
b&
All but God can prove this sentence true.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by frojack on Monday July 25 2016, @04:43PM
a woman who was raped was suspected of being a rapist, so somebody felt justified in kidnapping her and making her life a living hell...for what good purpose, exactly?
Way to totally misread what actually happened.
She was never suspected of being a rapist. Where did you see that?
She was thrown in jail by a District Attorney because he thought she was going to run away.
The "make her life a living hell" part is the result of a mentally unstable yet innocent person being tossed into prison and treated like any other criminal, with jail psychologists trying to talk her down.
Go back and re-read TFA or at least TFS. While doing so, Don't assume the wrack and red hot branding irons just because someone claimed "torture". And don't assume an MMA pummeling just because someone uses the term "beaten". Getting you hand slapped away while you were clutching at a jailer's throat qualifies as a beating in lawyer speak.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 5, Informative) by TrumpetPower! on Monday July 25 2016, @04:56PM
In TFS, which you yourself accused me of not reading:
Or, to help you with your reading comprehension, defendants are the ones accused (or "suspected") of committing a crime -- and "sexual assault" means either rape or something that was heading in that direction.
Way to spectacularly miss the whole point of my post -- namely, that nobody -- not even the "any other criminal"s -- should be treated like that.
I mean, really. Were somebody here writing about how understandable it would be for somebody in a sanitarium to be freaked out by being straightjacketed and chained to a wall for days on end in their own soiled clothing, with the implication that that's a perfectly reasonable way to treat somebody with a mental illness...well, you'd be horrified at the notion that anybody would be treated like that, right?
So what on Earth has made those merely accused of a crime be as undeserving of basic human compassion and respect as the mentally ill were a century ago?
We're supposed to be better than this...and yet there're far too many -- such as you yourself -- who pride themselves in their barbarity.
What the bloody fuck?
b&
All but God can prove this sentence true.
(Score: 3, Touché) by frojack on Monday July 25 2016, @05:38PM
The employee booking her in identified her as a defendant because he had an order from the district attorney stating that she was a defendant. Is that so hard to understand?
Jail warden's do not get to second guess the Sheriff or the District Attorney. Oh, what's that you say Miss? You're innocent? Oh dear, Well you can go then. Have a nice day. Sorry for the mistake.
.
There was no treatment that was unusual that I can see. In fact it was better than you would see in most county jails. A person with an actual medical degree attended to her, and attempted to calm her down.
Perhaps you are asserting that all psychiatric services should be pulled from every jail in the country. Are you claiming that merely having a psychiatrist visit a distraught inmate is some sort of crime of torture by society against an obviously innocent person?
Stop this nonsense about straight jackets and chains. You are simply inflaming the situation with things that didn't happen.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by TrumpetPower! on Monday July 25 2016, @06:14PM
frojack (1554) wrote:
And, yet, according to frojack (1554):
So, which is it? Was she in jail because the DA thought she was going to refuse to testify against her own rapist or because she was a defendant suspected of sexual assualt according to the DA's signature on the paperwork?
Believe it or not, I actually agree with you on this fact.
Where we differ is that you seem to think that that's a good thing, or at least acceptable; I, on the other hand, find it horrific and a most poignant indinctment of our for-profit prison industry.
b&
All but God can prove this sentence true.
(Score: 3, Informative) by frojack on Monday July 25 2016, @07:01PM
So, which is it? Was she in jail because the DA thought she was going to refuse to testify against her own rapist or because she was a defendant suspected of sexual assualt according to the DA's signature on the paperwork?
Read TFS again. And maybe the TFA as well.
You will find out the DA lied, in order to prevent her running away, he alleged she was a defendant in a rape trial.
Maybe by mistake, but that seems unlikely. Mistakes don't last a month. Most probably because he could hold her longer under an arrest warrant than he could under a material witness warrant.
The DA never suspected she was a perpetrator.
And by the way, a county Jail is not a for profit prison operation.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by FatPhil on Tuesday July 26 2016, @08:39AM
> The DA never suspected she was a perpetrator.
Yes, but everyone else who saw or heard his lie, no matter how indirectly, *did* (at least have grounds, depending on how much faith they have in the DA or the system, to) suspect she might be a rapist. You appear to be trying to defend yourself as if you had made a different argument. Your actual argument was:
> She was never suspected of being a rapist.
Which flies against all facts and all reason - including facts and reasons you have subsequently presented yourself. You're just too proud to back down after making such a stupid statement, I can't believe anyone capable of stringing a few words together would still stand by such an absurdity unless contradiction was simply a way of life.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by frojack on Monday July 25 2016, @07:06PM
you seem to think that that's a good thing, or at least acceptable; I, on the other hand, find it horrific
So then, just to make it clear, you are going on record as stating that providing medical/psychiatric services to inmates is "poignant indinctment" of jails.
Throw them in, weld the doors shut, and toss in food. That's your plan.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by TrumpetPower! on Monday July 25 2016, @07:16PM
If that's the game you want to play, how about you tell us when you plan to stop beating your wife?
You're not fooling anybody with this unartful wordplay of yours; all you're doing is demonstrating a very childish degree of either reading comprehension or rhetorical skill. Either way, you're just scoring an own goal by demonstrating opponents of prison reform to be ignorant barbarians.
b&
All but God can prove this sentence true.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Zz9zZ on Monday July 25 2016, @08:31PM
Discussion does not matter in these cases, it is most frustrating. I had a similar discussion with a retired officer who worked for a short bit in a county jail and he was telling the group about how their sheriff had bought military rations (MREs) at a good price in order to save the county money. He was denied from serving them to inmates. From the retired guy's point of view this was a tragedy where the sheriff was punished for trying to do something good. I did a quick search and found info stating that MREs are not healthy to eat long term, and possibly might not have been unspoiled (they were from the gulf war...) It didn't matter what I said, I didn't know what I was talking about and was full of shit.
The problem is some people can't accept new information if it in any way alters their existing world view. This is a human problem that won't go away, and it cuts on both sides of the liberal/conservative line. Frojack, you're replies are way too defensive, as if you can't imagine that something wrong is being done in jails/prisons. These injustices happen every day, and I have much more sympathy for the abused than the people being accused of causing that abuse. Even if they're criminals.
As I tried to point out to the guy from my little story, restricting people's freedom is the punishment. Malnutrition and other abuses should not be tacked on by some angry officers who want the bad people to "pay". Again, they are paying by not being free and living with a bunch of other people who make their life quite unpleasant.
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday July 26 2016, @04:22AM
Thanks for being another person on this site who points out the steaming, crosseyed, grunting bullshit people like him put out. I can't comprehend what makes people behave like this, but knowing I'm not alone in this seemingly endless war is a relief.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by sjames on Monday July 25 2016, @10:19PM
According to TFA, they did NOT provide her with her meds.
So apparently, all they provided was an extremely bad environment for someone with a psychiatric problem to recover in.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Monday July 25 2016, @08:57PM
A little bit of extra-curricular punishment for (accused) sex offenders isn't exactly unheard of. [foxnews.com]
(Score: 2) by sjames on Monday July 25 2016, @10:15PM
There is the minor matter of failing to give her her meds, and locking her up in the same facility as her attacker.
Since other inmates were also said to have beaten her, I'm pretty sure they don't mean a pillow fight.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday July 26 2016, @08:25AM
Well, let's see who thinks she might be a criminal...
> being tossed into prison and treated like any other criminal
Ah, you do.
Nice sneakers - shame about the shotgun holes in them.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by fritsd on Monday July 25 2016, @08:54PM
The way I see it, her case (and MichaelDavidCrawford's clerks case) sound like there was an error made in the system, but for some reason this error was not acknowledged or corrected.
Like it is acceptable for "commoners" to make errors, but when somebody in authority makes an error, there is a possible "flee forward" behaviour: doubling down on the idea that the authority cannot acknowledge the flaw, and therefore cannot correct it, because that would be admission that an error was made.
I've never been in the army, but I guess that errors made in the army also "percolate downwards", because it is a hierarchical, authoritarian structure. That means admission of errors could lead to a weakening of that individual's position and status in the hierarchy.
But everybody makes errors, even if they really really shouldn't.
In the case of MicahelDavidCrawford's clerk, she should have percolated her error "up", writing a letter to whatever judiciary organization oversight exists in the US: "some commoner pointed out an error in form XYZ-3 having to do with confusion between pro se and pro per, can you let someone review that form please?" It's not MDC's fault that he made a "user-level" bug report, but she the courthouse clerk should escalate it to "second-line" bug report, if you know what I mean.
In the case of TFS (I haven't read TFA. sorry. don't sue me.) the person who put her in jail should have afterwards invoked the procedure "sorry I really really screwed up; that person is in jail for other reasons, she's not the defendant but victim of the alledged rape, modify her status on paper and inform the relevant guards and psychologists. and I gotta apologise."
Also: Guildford Four [wikipedia.org] ... they even made a film about it later..
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 25 2016, @09:08PM
They'll wonder how their ancestors could possibly have been so cruel and stupid.
Because... money?
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Monday July 25 2016, @04:29PM
simply to threaten to disbar him put him in a position of a conflict of interest. Had he not resigned, then I really could have disbarred him.
There is also the court reporter's record of my request and Judge Stahnke's permission.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 25 2016, @06:35PM
I still don't get it. "To disbar [thefreedictionary.com]" is "To prohibit an attorney from the practice of law by official action or procedure", in other words "to remove its license/authorization to be a lawyer", AFAIK.
I can imagine you could have fired him or sued him, but unless you're some kind of lawyer licensing authority (the Bar) or a judge, I fail to see how you could literally disbar him.
Now, of course suing him could eventually have had the consequence of getting him disbarred by such an authority, if found guilty of some sort of misconduct, but that's a long shot.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 25 2016, @06:38PM
oh wait, did you mean debar [thefreedictionary.com]? Then your sentence would make much more sense to me.
(Score: 2) by linuxrocks123 on Monday July 25 2016, @06:58PM
He couldn't disbar him, nor did he want to. What he did was file or make public his intent to file a hostile action or complaint against the lawyer with the bar association. At that point, the lawyer had a conflict of interest with his client and was ethically obligated to resign.
You can't represent someone who is suing you or is trying to get you disbarred, even if there's no chance in hell the disbarment attempt will succeed.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Monday July 25 2016, @07:30PM
I once complained about the plaintiff's ambulance chaser when he filed a defamation action due to his own fevered imagination.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2) by Dunbal on Monday July 25 2016, @05:31PM
No it's the magical power of conflict of interest.